Time to change the thread title to OSIRIS-APEX or create a new thread?
Quote from: Targeteer on 09/25/2023 03:50 pmSadly this lack of offering actual facts without having to draw them out has become the NASA standard in my humble opinion. With very few exceptions "briefers" have become PA shills who require dentists to extract facts like teeth but all too often, "reporters" don't want to be dentists... Anyone remember Bill Harwood having to call out NASA/SPACE X for the unknown/unacknowledged Dragon launch delay reason?I don't pay a lot of attention to these press conferences, so you may be right about the overall trend. A friend suggested that this is the social media influence, and NASA PR folks are more interested in short soundbites spread all over social media and not in detailed reporting. So they all want to be on TikTok and no longer care about Aviation Week or Space News, because that's a tiny audience.I also agree with you about reporters not wanting to dig out the information. There are exceptions of course (Harwood, as you note), but I really hate hate hate it when some reporter uses their very precious bit of question time to ask "How were you feeling?" They were excited. You know that. They are always excited. Stop searching for that platitudinous soundbite and stop asking mundane questions and try to get some actual facts into your article.Don't get me wrong: I'm not the kind of person who bashes the press or lumps them all into the same category. It's just that I really dislike superficiality in the media, and I respect hard work and professionalism. But I'm a dinosaur. Bring on the TikTok dance videos.
Sadly this lack of offering actual facts without having to draw them out has become the NASA standard in my humble opinion. With very few exceptions "briefers" have become PA shills who require dentists to extract facts like teeth but all too often, "reporters" don't want to be dentists... Anyone remember Bill Harwood having to call out NASA/SPACE X for the unknown/unacknowledged Dragon launch delay reason?
Quote from: Barley on 09/26/2023 04:08 pmA press conference, like a college lecture or business presentation is pretty much all show and no substance. A simulacrum that lets people feel good about not doing the work and not understanding.That's not true. I have seen press conferences with substantive information. For planetary missions, NASA has often used them to roll out images and even some initial data. They hold up releasing some factual data specifically to present it at a press conference.Now there are also different kinds of press conferences aimed at different audiences. When the shuttle was flying NASA used to hold a pre-flight conference without the astronauts specifically to discuss the status of the vehicle, timelines, etc. It is possible that overall NASA press conferences have evolved to become more superficial and focused on social media, but I would not say that all of them are like that.
A press conference, like a college lecture or business presentation is pretty much all show and no substance. A simulacrum that lets people feel good about not doing the work and not understanding.
You can release information over any channel, but we largely solved the problem of dissemination in the 19th century with the mimeograph and completely solved it with the internet. Even if press conferences disseminate information they are a very poor way of doing it. Press conferences are all and only about gratifying the monkey brain. The examples you give, such as holding back information for a press conference are dominance games, not disseminating information.
The capsule is open! #OSIRISREx
The OSIRIS-REx Sample Canister Lid is RemovedNASA scientists found black dust and debris on the avionics deck of the OSIRIS-REx science canister when the initial lid was removed today. The canister from the OSIRIS-REx sample return capsule was delivered to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston on Sept. 25 after landing in the Utah desert on Sept. 24. Johnson houses the world’s largest collection of astromaterials, and curation experts there will perform the intricate disassembly of the Touch and Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM) to get down to the bulk sample within. These operations are happening in a new laboratory designed specifically for the OSIRIS-REx mission. The aluminum lid was removed inside a glovebox designed to enable working with the large piece of hardware.When the TAGSAM is separated from the canister, it will be inserted in a sealed transfer container to preserve a nitrogen environment for up to about two hours. This container allows enough time for the team to insert the TAGSAM into another unique glovebox. Ultimately, this speeds up the disassembly process. There is a very high level of focus from the team — the sample will be revealed with an amazing amount of precision to accommodate delicate hardware removal so as not to come into contact with the sample inside.With an array of team members on deck, scientists and engineers at Johnson will work together to complete the disassembly process and reveal the sample to the world in a special live broadcast event on Oct. 11 at 11 a.m. ET, streamed at NASA.gov/live.Shaneequa VereenNASA’s Johnson Space Center, HoustonAuthor Rob GarnerPosted on September 26, 2023Categories OSIRIS-RExTags Johnson Space Center, Sample Curation, Sample Return
Lockheed Martin Recovery Specialists Levi Hanish and Michael Kaye remove the lid of the sample return canister. Credit: NASA/Robert Markowiz
During one of the pressers they said they probably just be able to get the "extra" materials outside the TAGSAM itself (obvious in that photo) off the vehicle and out to their labs. I think extracting the entire sample out of it (and thus getting total mass) is going to take a lot longer than a few days.
Quote from: ChrisC on 09/27/2023 03:42 amDuring one of the pressers they said they probably just be able to get the "extra" materials outside the TAGSAM itself (obvious in that photo) off the vehicle and out to their labs. I think extracting the entire sample out of it (and thus getting total mass) is going to take a lot longer than a few days.But they know how much the equipment is supposed to weigh, so they should be able to weigh it and anything over that known mass will be collected material. They were going to use something like that method to measure the sample mass while in space, but they had to seal everything up because they were losing material.
I just saw the hi-res shot of the OSIRIS REx sample container after opening, and I’m amazed at how much dust we see. When the TAGSAM system was developed the regolith simlulants weren’t anywhere close to this fine. But also, no trace of the larger pieces visible in space.
The challenge of fitting enough high quality instrumentation onto a spacecraft, in one photo.
Warming up the machines to analyze Osiris REx samples!
Initial Curation of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx SampleThe initial curation process for NASA’s OSIRIS-REx sample of asteroid Bennu is moving slower than anticipated, but for the best reason: the sample runneth over. The abundance of material found when the science canister lid was removed earlier this week has meant that the process of disassembling the TAGSAM (Touch-and-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism) head – which holds the bulk of material from the asteroid – is off to a methodical start.After the collection event on Bennu three years ago, scientists expected they could find some asteroid material in the canister outside the TAGSAM head when they saw particles slowly escaping the head before it was stowed. However, the actual amount of dark particles coating the inside of the canister lid and base that surrounds the TAGSAM is even more than they’d anticipated.“The very best ‘problem’ to have is that there is so much material, it’s taking longer than we expected to collect it,” said deputy OSIRIS-REx curation lead Christopher Snead of NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “There’s a lot of abundant material outside the TAGSAM head that’s interesting in its own right. It’s really spectacular to have all that material there.”The first sample collected from outside the TAGSAM head, on the avionics deck, is now in the hands of scientists who are performing a quick-look analysis, which will provide an initial understanding of the Bennu material and what we can expect to find when the bulk sample is revealed.“We have all the microanalytical techniques that we can throw at this to really, really tear it apart, almost down to the atomic scale,” said Lindsay Keller, OSIRIS-REx sample analysis team member from Johnson.The quick-look research will utilize various instruments, including a scanning electron microscope (SEM), infrared measurements, and x-ray diffraction (XRD), to gain a better understanding of the sample.The SEM will offer a chemical and morphological analysis, while the infrared measurements should provide information on whether the sample contains hydrated minerals and organic-rich particles. The x-ray diffraction is sensitive to the different minerals in a sample and will give an inventory of the minerals and perhaps an indication of their proportions.“You’ve got really top-notch people and instruments and facilities that are going to be hitting these samples,” Keller said.This quick-look science is a tool that will offer more data to researchers as they approach the larger pieces of sample for follow-on analysis.Over the coming weeks, the curation team will move the TAGSAM head into a different specialized glovebox where they will undertake the intricate process of disassembly to ultimately reveal the bulk sample within.Rachel BarryNASA’s Johnson Space Center, Houston
QuoteThe challenge of fitting enough high quality instrumentation onto a spacecraft, in one photo.
Quote from: FutureSpaceTourist on 09/30/2023 05:21 amQuoteThe challenge of fitting enough high quality instrumentation onto a spacecraft, in one photo.And that's just one lab. I think the quick response to anybody who suggests that you can do great in-situ analysis is to note that you cannot fit a cyclotron in a lander.
